The Match, The Stat: Newcastle 2-3 Liverpool
Can't Liverpool just win a match in routine fashion? It appears not.
Liverpool are determined to make 2025/26 as exciting as possible, or so it seems. The club has only scored more goals in its opening two games of a Premier League campaign four times; only twice has it conceded more across the first 180 minutes. None of those campaigns overlap, illustrating the chaos currently occurring at both ends.
For the second game running, Hugo Ekitike helped put Liverpool 2-0 up while wearing the 22 shirt, only for the scoreline to later become 2-2. Makes you think, doesn’t it? It shouldn’t.
Far worthier of contemplation is Liverpool conceding twice to a 10-man team, as they did against Newcastle on Monday. Jürgen Klopp’s Reds allowed a single goal when playing with a man advantage, which Arne Slot equalled when his side conceded to Lille last season.
Both goals coming from set plays would’ve rubbed salt in the head coach’s wounds had his charges dropped two points. Slot has spoken about his desire for his team to score more set piece goals than they concede; who knew? He went on record regarding the issue after a 2-2 draw at Aston Villa last season.
“The only thing I’m not happy with is: if you play a big game, an away game at [Aston] Villa, that’s a difficult one and you need to have a neutral set piece balance or a positive one, but we conceded one, didn’t score one. Then it’s hard.”
Speaking of Villa, they are the only side who have conceded fewer Premier League goals from corners than Liverpool since the start of last season. One of the three the Reds have allowed occurred when 4-0 up against Ipswich (frankly, who cares) with another at Fulham in the second phase after a clearance.
Dominic Solanke scored the other, which is largely forgotten as Slot’s men thumped in five goals in reply to seal the league title. It is other free-kicks (plus throw-ins) which have proven more problematic.
Arsenal, Newcastle, Everton and Villa all scored from non-corner set plays in league matches Liverpool failed to win last term. The Magpies almost did this in back-to-back campaigns thanks to Will Osula’s goal and you can be certain the Gunners will be hoping to do likewise on Sunday.
Eddie Howe’s men made it a battle from the start. It was more akin to that most dirty of words to many football fans: rugby. Liverpool dealt with that threat reasonably well, until they didn’t.
The Reds’ cause was not helped by referee Simon Hooper happily buying anything Newcastle were selling. It took a VAR intervention for Anthony Gordon to be sent off when it looked a clear red card challenge.
The former Evertonian joins Andreas Christensen, Paul Pogba and Nélson Semedo in being sent off against Liverpool following a video review. Hooper’s performance art officiating meant the game became a rare one for the Reds with at least 15 fouls committed and suffered. Like I said, a battle.
Whether the physical nature of the context affected Florian Wirtz, the match mostly passed him by. The German didn’t make a final third pass in his final 29 minutes, not that Liverpool completed many in that time either. He was at least working hard, making the most pressures for the team here after topping the division for counter pressures in week one.
The only surprise about Wirtz being substituted in the 80th minutes was that he was part of the first (double) change Slot made from the bench. This was later than his first such move came in any match last season. I haven’t seen that he was asked why this was; here are some ideas, have a vote:
The changes sparked Liverpool into life. Substitute Conor Bradley linked up with Mohamed Salah in the 86th minute which enabled the Reds to complete a couple of passes in the Newcastle penalty box for the first time in over half an hour. The problem was that the right-back then lost the ball before committing the foul which led to the Magpies’ equaliser.
It was disappointing that Liverpool did not offer enough of a consistent threat when a man up in the second half. “Every time when we were quite calm in the build-up but then we ended with our attackers [where] they should keep the ball longer and every time [they] forced a pass,” Slot said after the match.
Their struggles do at least accentuate the beauty of the move for the winning goal. Liverpool unleashed a move of progressive triangle-style movements when Newcastle finally had a point to protect. Maybe the home side had nothing left to give after fighting back with 10, but it was a remarkable sequence from the Reds in any circumstances, never mind these.
Rio Ngumoha’s goal was just the fifth Liverpool shot of the contest. As one from Cody Gakpo indirectly led to Ekitike scoring, the Reds only mustered four shot-generating attacks.
The numbers should have been a little better. Salah delivered a perfect cross for Curtis Jones to record an instance of Opta’s lesser-spotted ‘big chance missed ball’. This occurs when a player fails to make contact with the ball when in position for a high value opportunity. Salah was more annoyed than any of us immediately afterwards.
This brings us to the stat of the match: Liverpool scoring three non-penalty goals from just five shots. The Reds’ previous low mark in the FBRef database was the nine they had when beating Manchester City 3-0 in the Champions League.
Nobody was bothered about a relative lack of shots that night, nor should they have been. But this proficiency won’t be repeated. It happens less than once every two seasons in the Premier League.
Liverpool thankfully don’t play many matches with quite as many rucks, mauls or scrums as they had to at Newcastle either. The fiery nature of the fixture means it evades analysis in many ways. Bank the points, give Rio a hug and move on.
For the second game running, Hugo Ekitike helped put Liverpool 2-0 up while wearing the 22 shirt, only for the scoreline to later become 2-2. Makes you think, doesn’t it? It shouldn’t.
😁😁😁